Kommienezuspadt
by Colours Doyle
Summary: Holmes is not a man easily amazed by silly little magic tricks, much less done by a woman. But when a newly arrived magician, Daria, is suspected for the murder of a heir to the Queen, he's not about to let himself believe and walk though that illusion.
1. Chapter 1

"If I may say so once again, this is the up most absurd thing we've ever had to do for a case." Sherlock bespoke with grudge and annoyance behind his words when his body slouched in his chair, as if his physicality didn't speak for itself.

"Holmes, it's only a magic show, calm yourself." Watson said, agitation climbing through his own words as he'd dealt with his dear friend's ranting and raving and complaints about how much he'd rather not wish to sit through a magic show when everything was so bluntly obvious that he was never amazed, nor amused one bit. "Besides, I heard that this illusionist is supposed to be a great treat. Mary was still in awe this morning when she told me about the show last night, said that she grew an orange tree from a small pot of dirt in less than a minute."

"Impossible, obviously it was some mechanical device built into a table or even the pot itself." Holmes said, disregarding it as if it were nothing, and with a wave of his hand.

"Said she guessed everyone's name in the entire audience."

"Performers are very social people who have people working for them, something as simple at that should be lucid enough for even someone like you, Watson." He squirmed in his seat like a child as the theater began to fill, each and every seat filled, not even room to stand on the side arms as the low class citizens of London consumed the extra area.

As the lights in the theater began to darken, the lamps on the stage lit up and a tall man walked on stage, with light blonde hair that contrasted with the scarlet curtain that hung lazily behind him. He began, his strong and native accent filling the walls.

"Life and death. Space and time. Fate and chance. These are the forces of the universe. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, I present to you a woman who has unlocked these mysteries." Holmes immediately rolled his eyes at the absurdity, "From the furthest corners of the world where the dark arts still hold sway she returns to us to demonstrate how nature's laws may be bent. I give you...Daria." And as the introducer's arm sways behind him, presenting the crowd to their entertainment, the curtain rises up yet there is no one on stage, not even the man.

There was a low murmur of voices rising in wonder of what was going on, when suddenly, there was a loud laughing coming from the stage, back stage it seemed. Heavy footsteps, running footsteps, and there were suddenly two people on stage, one running from the other. The poor soul had no weapons and was very scrawny compared to the hound of a man chasing him with a shining silver cutlass. The unarmed man suddenly ran of stage and back on stage, towing a large blanket behind him. He tripped the villain and jumped to the front of the stage, spreading the blanket out like a small wall that separated him from the audience. But with a sudden swift motion pulled the blanket away to reveal a large cutlass of their own, protruding from a large stone. He yanked the sword from the rock like King Arthur dove towards the villain, clashing swords.

They fought for several moments, before the villain knocked the cutlass from the smaller man's hands, and held him up from the stage floor by the collar of his shirt.

"Is there anything you have to say for yourself, you slimy little magician?" The man growled, the age in his voice sounded forced and utterly fake, Holmes had known that this was all a scene from the moment the cutlass appeared out of "no where", when there was obviously a trap door. But he kept his attention towards the stage. The smaller man had murmured something, and the blade was held to his chest. "What was that?"

His feet dangled in the air, trying to get loose from his grip, when he said nothing the sword was then plunged through his stomach. Women around him screamed, but Holmes payed no attention as his eyes were dead set on the stage watching the wounded man with a sword protruding from his back. The nasty, fat murder dropped his grip from the man's shirt, but when 99% of the audience thought the dead man would fall to the ground with a dead-weight thud, he clutched onto the man's hands and swung himself over the head of the villain, landing on his feet behind him.

The audience reaction to this was phenomenal and he quickly yanked the cutlass from his chest and rammed it into the back of his attacker. Everyone clapped as the smaller man opened himself to the audience, and flipped off his hat. Out flowed long brown locks that framed an obvious feminine face. The audience clapped even more as she smiled. This was Daria, the Illusionist.

"Thank you." She said, and slightly kicked the struggling man to the wing, out of sight. "Thank you." She threw the hat to the audience and it burst into shiny sparkles, putting the audience in awe. She spun around quickly, but steadily and her men's trousers had miraculously formed together and became a flowing dark green skirt that swayed on the stage.

She pulled out a small decorated box from behind her back, "Might I borrow a handkerchief from someone?" A few raised up soft white handkerchiefs and she spotted someone close to the front, and on the end. "Ah, you madam." It took a few moments for Holmes to realize that a woman next to him had offered her dainty handkerchief and placed it into the box. "Keep it in your lap, and be patient." She winked at the woman who smiled and nodded guilty, for she'd tried to sneak a look, Holmes rolled his eyes once more and turned back to the stage.

"Now, I would like to continue with an examination of time. From the moment we enter this life, we are in the flow of it." She lifts her right hand and a medium sized egg seems to grow from between her fingers, she rolls it from the top of her hand to her palm over and over skillfully, "We measure it and we mark it, but we cannot defy it." And it's suddenly balanced on the top, "We cannot even speed it up," and the egg rolls under to her palm on it's own, "or slow it down. Or can we? Have we not each experienced the sensation that the beautiful moments seemed to pass too quickly..." She holds the egg up and it drops to her other hand below, she brings it up once more, "and wished that we could make it linger?" She drops it a second time, only this time it was as if her actions and the object represented her wise words as the egg seemed to slow it's pace from one hand to the other. _Remarkable..._Holmes thought, his eyes never leaving the woman for one moment, "Or felt time slow on a dull day...and wished we could speed things up a bit?"

She looks out into the audience, her eyes in prominent and precise concentration, as she sets the egg upon a table and holds her hand over it. Daria breaths in and the audience gasps as the egg seems to grow in size, twice, three, four, five times the size as it had been and changed from a pure white to a dull tan. And then the egg began to shake, rolling around on the surface. A gasp from the audience once more as the egg begins to break, a faint crackling sound could be heard if you were listening closely, and Holmes had been, intently.

Daria sighed slightly, and a small white head popped out from the egg, and soon the beautiful body of a grown swan stood on the table, squawking slightly. The crowd bursts like the button on a richly spoiled boy's trousers into applause and she smiles slightly.

"I assure you, she is quite real." Daria said, running her hand over the back of the majestic, magical swan. "And madam, where is your handkerchief?"

Holmes turns to the woman who volunteered her handkerchief to see her stand and show that the box was empty. He turned back to the stage in time to see two bright blue butterflies had flown onto stage, the woman's handkerchief in tow. Clapping erupted around him and Daria smiles, bowing to her faithful audience. Well, aside from one man who still sat while everyone gave her a standing ovation, Holmes tried to rack his mind for possible explanations as to how on god's green earth had she managed to compel such...obviously mechanical illusions.

She thanks the audience and walks back stage as the curtain crashes down to the stage, signaling that the show had come to an end.

"That was utterly fantastic, wasn't it?"

"Yes..." Holmes said, his eyes wondering around, "it was...I suppose tomorrow if we arrive here around mid-day we'd be able to sneak back stage without a problem at all."

And the detective duo waited until the next day and crept back into the room with the ocean of chairs through a fire escape in the alley. It was completely dark, despite the sun that shined it's bright light through the sky light.

"Holmes?" He heard Watson call, and saw he was up by the stage. Holmes followed the man up the steps and observed the stage floor, with the difficultly caused by the lighting, he couldn't see a trap door at all. Not a single hidden handle, nor hinges. He sighed and began to walk back stage with Watson.

A light suddenly volumized not far from him, flowing through the cracks of a swinging door. Curiosity getting the better of his good and intelligent judgment, Holmes followed the light into the room, swinging the door open with just a nudge of his elbow.

"Watson." He said, gesturing for the doctor to follow him.

The room held a very rich glow about it, a small workshop with wooden chairs and tools assorted along tables. Holmes would inspect every inch of the room for any possible signs for a murder weapon. Because, after all, that's why the good doctor and himself were there; investigating prior suspects for the murder of Eden Alexander.

Holmes' eye caught the table in which the egg was set upon earlier in the evening where it had hatched. He walked over to the table, felt underneath it for some type of large device but only felt the flat bottom of the table.

There were soft footsteps in the hall that connected to the room that held Watson and Holmes, and in the midst of their investigation, a voice stopped them.

"What do you think you're doing in here? Get away from that." Daria's calm but commanding voice caught both men off guard but Holmes quickly straightened himself as Watson took the lead as Holmes observed the woman before them.

Not a tall woman, just about as average as any he'd seen. Her eyes held no colour, only an absence of colour for they seemed to be either a dark, dark brown or even black itself. Her skin looked very thin as if it would rip like paper if too much pressure was layed upon it, slightly flawless but Holmes could see where a tad of stage make-up had been applied to cover a blemish of some sort. But she was hiding something else, that he could tell.

"We apologize for intruding, we saw your show yesterday, very impressive," she nods, keeping her eyes on him, "My name is Jonathan Watson, and this is my partner Sherlock Holmes."

"How can I help you, detective?" She asked, her eyes on Holmes now. Holmes raised an eyebrow, for they had not mentioned that either was a detective.

"As you may know you are one of few suspects suspected for the murder of Eden Alexander. So we obviously must inspect your theater, and set up a time where we can interrogate you." Holmes spoke, his eyes lingering on the table he'd been inspecting moments before.

"I hardly think that my table is capable of such invidious crimes." Her voice was so uncharacteristically calm, it was natural coming from her. Sherlock smirked as she walked towards him and her table.

"Yes, the wonderful swan trick, very illusive."

"I've seen things like that before, but never one like that," Watson said, leaning against the table, "Extraordinary."

"Thank you."

"How did you do it? Some sort of machinery within the legs of the table?" Holmes asked, his eyes on the woman, trying to figure something more from her, anything from her. Two things he knew for certain, she was not from England, judging by her foreign accent, and she did many things with her hands, as they were calloused and scratched. "And the butterflies, especially how you got the butterflies to fly." She smirks and nodded, with the knowledge of everything behind her eyes.

"You can't figure it out, Mr. Holmes?" Her smirk never fades but her curiosity seems to bloom from knowledge to the want to know.

"A thin wire attached from the top of the stage, most likely."

Daria crosses her arms casually, "That would be one way to do it. You are a skeptic?"

Watson snorts rudely and Daria smiles, "Asking if Holmes is a skeptic is like asking him if he has two eyes."

"Oh, but being a skeptic is just fine, it makes the prestige all the greater. Doctor Watson, you are a man that allows himself to be amazed without questioning it." Daria says, Holmes eying her as if she were about to run off. An orange ball appears in her hand as she rolls it between her fingers. "I'll show you a trick I am very fond of. Are you a gambling man?"

Watson and Holmes share a glance but nothing more, "On occasion."

"I will bet your friend here the secret of the swan egg that I can guess which hand you place this in every time." She hands Watson the ball and turns around, "Put it in your fist, raise your hand against your forehead...concentrate on it, form a mental picture."

"Yes."

"Have you got it?"

"Yes."

"Put your hands in front of you." Watson does and she turns back around. Looking at his hands, and with ease and causality, she reaches over and places her palm on his right hand, "It's in your right." Watson opens his hand to reveal the plump orange ball. "A lucky guess, perhaps?"

"Hidden mirrors," Holmes spoke, watching Watson's amazed face, "Only hidden mirrors my dear friend."

Daria smirks, "No. It's more primitive than that." She holds her hand out, and Watson places it in her palm, "When you raise your hand to your head, the blood drains from it." She does so, then brings it back in front of her and compares it with her other, "It will be paler every time." She hands the ball back to him.

Watson smiles and laughs, "Huh, I like that. I like that very much."

"I thought you would," Daria crosses her hands behind her back, "Now, detective, doctor, if you don't mind, I've got to prepare for tonight's performance."

"We still must hold an interrogation, run questions by you, if you don't mind."

"Oh, yes, well it will have to wait until tomorrow. I've no show tomorrow, so anytime would be great for me." Her voice calm and serene when speaking to Holmes, he nods. She turns to leave but stops momentarily, "And perhaps tomorrow you can use the front door, instead of the fire escape, Mr. Holmes, Dr. Watson." And she leaves the room with an air of odd yet calming excitement, leaving the two men slightly dumbfounded.


	2. Chapter 2

**I hope you enjoy, tell me how you like it?**

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"Where were you on the night of the fourteenth?" Holmes asked, he himself alone with the woman who called herself an illusionist, a magician, a bender of belief, Daria, if that was her real name at all. She sat with her legs crossed in a wooden chair like a child as he had sat himself in front of her, still observing her.

"I was doing a show for the Queen, and her lovely family." He heard a hint of mild sarcasm as she threw in the un-needed adjective, but he didn't question it.

"Had you spoken with any of the royal family, whether that night or any other time before or after?"

"I hadn't until that night," Daria still spoke with such a calming voice, Holmes felt himself growing comfortable in her gaze but yet, something about that gaze put him on edge and held him there, "For the last act of my performance that night I asked for a volunteer, and Elaine Alexander volunteered."

"And what type of trick was it?" He asked, curiosity forming.

"It was only a simple illusion. I brought out a mirror and did a few mis-reflections, nothing really spectacular. But I never met Eden, nor did I collude in the murder of the girl. I don't know why Elaine thinks I did."

"How—"

"Word gets around...I have good ears." She answered, cutting him off completely, a small smirk on her lips.

"This trick you did, would it have had any negative affect on Miss Elaine, enough for her to act out against you?" Not even a flicker of the eyes, no nervous movements, she was as calm as a Hindu cow.

"I'm sure any normal person would be a bit startled if their reflection was anything other than themselves, but she didn't seemed too phased." Holmes nodded. If she was telling the complete truth, and no lies (which was most likely the case) then Daria was not the murderer, and it had to be either the two other leads he'd been given.

He glanced up at her through his thought riddled mind and noticed she looked as though she were about to say something, but stopped herself before she spoke. She started again, "I have noticed if you look carefully at people's eyes the first five seconds they look at you, the truth of their feelings will shine through for just an instant before it flickers away." She lifted her hand in the air and flicked it up, like a leaf blowing in the wind. "You do something similar, do you not?"

Holmes nodded slightly, "In a fashion, yes. I detect various characteristics of a person by the physical appearance one may have." A smirk rose upon Daria's lips as she uncrossed her legs and leaned forward in intrigue.

"As I'm sure you may get this often, but may I ask what you detected from my physical appearance?" Holmes narrowed his eyes in suspicion, knowing that he can never let his guard down around her for one moment, or she'll find some way to confuse his messy thoughts in a visual illusion. But, he leaned back in his chair and eyed her once more.

"You haven't had a decent night's sleep in several weeks." She nods, "You're accent is very hidden but I can tell you were raised in Bulgaria. I once met a Bulgarian man, his accent was strikingly similar to the dialect of yours...You were working with a hammer earlier this morning, fixing that table of yours."

Daria smiled, a row of glowing white teeth. It was a nice compliment to not so unattractive appearance, yet very uncommon for Holmes' eyes. "How did you know?"

"At the door when you gestured I noticed a bump on the inside of your thumb, a splinter from where you gripped the wooden hammer. When we walked past your workshop, it seemed so strikingly obvious that a leg had broken on your table and you replaced it with a lighter, granted a similar shade but lighter ply of wood and finished just before you opened the door." She nodded, but she was unimpressed, Holmes could tell. He could see she was waiting for the big secret to come out, but he was still trying to figure that out himself. He stood and began to walk around the room they were in, her eyes didn't follow him, "You are a very gifted performer, no doubt grew up around performers, but..." and at this, her eyes shot up, "they were not your mother or father." Daria looked down, but nothing more, just looked down. And that gave Holmes the satisfaction that his subconscious assumption was right, she grew up without a mother and father; she had a very independent air about her, and with taking a shot in the dark could be described as a life without those figures.

"I've never spoken to anyone about that." Daria stood, walking over to Holmes slowly, her eyes on his as her bare feet made not a sound, "Not a soul." She was surprisingly only a few inches shy the top of his head, but she still had to look up at an angle as she approached Holmes, "I'd like to keep it that way." Holmes nodded, a small voice in the back of his mind telling him that such close proximity with this female cannot end well, and he backed away before her breath could be felt on his neck any longer. And she smiles at this, and picks up a cup of tea that she'd poured earlier, "Tea?" She hands Holmes the cup, and he looks into the liquid, smells it, before taking a drink of it. But when he expected the rich taste of tea to meet his lips, he felt a solid bump into them. The tea had frozen. He quickly sets the cup down and eyes Daria as she looks out the window. She opens it up and plucks a flower from a tree vine that fell in through the light of the sun.

"Well, I seem to have gotten everything I need..."

"Before you send yourself off, I want to give you something," Daria walks back over to him, holding the flower between her fingers, "to remember me by."

She crumbles the purple in her hand and then cups the bits of it in her palms. Bringing her hands up to her mouth, she blows and releases her hold on the shards of the flower, yet nothing falls to the ground. But she reaches into Sherlock's coat, and suddenly pulls the small purple flower from the inside pocket.

"Thank you for stopping by, Mr. Holmes." She smiles and places the flower in the palm of his hand. Holmes smiles politely and nods.

"Have a good afternoon, Miss Daria." And Holmes leaves the theater with the small flower, his thoughts racing in wonder. He thought briefly on the case on his walk back to Baker Street, he realized that the murderer was obviously someone in the family, but he'd still had to dig a little deeper to be sure. Then his thoughts strayed to Daria, and the frozen tea, and the purple flower. How had she managed to freeze the tea within the milliseconds he'd inspected it, to the moment he put the cup to his lips? Had she used a clever slight of hand to convey the magic that he had the flower in his coat pocket? And most of all, why did Holmes have the strongest inkling to see her again?

* * *

That night, Daria woke with such a sudden start, her partner stirred in the sheets next to her, but never stirred awake. She breathed heavily, holding the pale sheets to her breast as she remembered her dream. Her dream, she dreamt of a man, he held her. It had been such a long time since a man had actually held her lovingly, and not...lustingly. Daria strained through her thoughts to try and recall the man's face, but she could not remember. She couldn't even remember the colour of his hair, much less his actual face, but she knew one thing; that she felt safe in the incubus' arms. And as she laid her head back down on the pillow, her eyes drifted shut, in hopes of reliving the beautiful moment.

* * *

Dark brown eyes, dark orbs. Seven freckles on her left cheek, eight on her right. She stood five-foot-six with hair as dark as her eyes but skin as pale as the milk he drank. Delicate hands, articulate motions, constant. And Holmes could not find the moment to rest his thoughts enough to close his eyes and dream. Daria was all the detective could think of.

Dark eyes.

Dark hair, so thick yet shorter than an english woman's.

He remembered her breath on his neck, imagined it right this moment. But he soon realized what he was thinking was completely preposterous. Completely.

The following morning was nothing unlike the night before, as he'd barely gotten any sleep at all due to his adolescent thoughts. As he sipped on his tea in the morning light, his roommate sitting across from him, reading the daily paper Holmes could not help but let his mind drift back to the Illusionist, back to that dark haired little devil. She was a devil, he was most certain. A devil, plaguing his mind like a slimy serpent. Before long she'd be seducing him, manipulating him. The devil.

"Holmes, dare I ask, what is it that has taken ahold of your mind as of late?" Watson asked, "Surely not the case."

He looked up momentarily only to look back down again, "Nothing to worry over, my friend, just pondering a few thoughts."

"How did the interview with Daria go?" Holmes' eyes shot up, and he stopped himself before he stuttered.

"Oh, perfectly...fine. She's not our man-er, woman." The doctor nodded and went back to the paper. His eyes on the words yet his mouth seemed to have other plans as he spoke out.

"It had to be the sister, am I right?" Holmes nodded.

"Yes, there's no one else but her." He said, distraction evidently clear in his voice. But a sudden knocking on the door brought both the men's attention to Ms. Hudson leading Constable Clark from Scotland Yard into the room. His torso clad in uniform black though Sherlock spotted a bit of a stain on his shoulder. "Good morning Clarky, how's the baby doing today?"

"He's got a bit of a cold, Mr. Holmes, but nothing to worry over. Moreover, I come asking the both of you to the Yard." Clark spoke in an awkward stance, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, a complete distraction it was to figuring out why he was really there.

"Why must you ask the two of us to Scotland Yard?" Holmes asked bluntly, leaning back in his chair and taking light of any possible response.

"Daria the Illusionist has been taken into custody early this morning."


End file.
